…was how Mukhov introduced the men from Sausen Petroleum, though neither fellow struck me as remotely Swiss. Their Slavic mugs, like their names, left no mistake as to their citizenship. Their speech and clothes, however, bespoke a more tangled marriage between Northern and Southern Europe: Anglicized Russian accents suggestive of London educations, narrow suits with Italian tailoring. Costumed in Gucci, the two looked terrifically pleased to meet us, indeed. When Gucci Number One pumped my hand, it was with a pleasure so forceful I had the sense he was hoping to squeeze a few squirts of petroleum from my palm.
Our meeting took a while to get started, since every L-Pet executive on the floor wanted to drop in and wish our Geneva friends the best of luck. Clearly no luck was needed. So secure were the Gucci brothers in their confidence that they casually declined all the antiquarian devices we offered them for their presentation. They had no use for the pull-down screen or the slide projector, no need of laptops with PowerPoint. Not to suggest they were lacking in manners—quite the opposite. They were as amiable as could be; they delivered the same speech, about their long and loyal service to L-Pet (as its former oil broker), at least twice. It seemed their strategy was to speak as little as possible about what they actually planned to do as our oil shipper, and simply let the authority of Abuskalayev’s name do the work of persuading. After an hour and a half of this “presentation,” almost impressive in its nearly flawless lack of content, the Gucci twins asked if we had any questions for them.
I had a question: How were they planning on operating the ships we were building? Gucci Number Two’s knowing smile presaged his answer. “We’ll hire professionals, of course.”
The professionals they intended to hire turned out to be “the best crew from Sovcomflot”—one of the competing bidders.
I did the math in my head. Sovcomflot was bidding sixty-five thousand a day. Sausen’s bid was $111,000. So, building the same ships, at the same shipyard, employing essentially the same operator, they intended to charge us an extra seventeen million dollars per annum for the next ten years. “Your bid is considerably higher than Sovcomflot’s,” I said. “Do you mind spelling out what this extra money pays for?”
“Certainly. What you are getting is”—and almost in unison our new friends from Geneva uttered a phrase incubated so long ago inside the womb of American capitalism that on their dandy tongues it sounded disarmingly quaint—“quality control.”
The only question remaining was the one that couldn’t be asked in the open: With whom, among L-Pet’s suited ranks, were the Gucci boys planning to split the 170 mil? Was it Mukhov, or Serdyuk, both now bobbing their heads in stern agreement? Was it CEO Abuskalayev himself? Very possibly it was Kablukov, the Boot, though his absence from our meeting suggested ambiguous commitment to his own racketeering—unless he simply didn’t like to be present when his orders were executed. I looked over my shoulder at Tom. Surely, he could spot the two-bit swindlers disguised behind all that worldly swank. Since Tom was leading the financial end of this joint venture, I lamely hoped that he might have some artful way of broaching the $170-million question. But the Clintonesque squint he flashed me was of no comfort at all. Without acknowledging my wordless plea, Tom allowed his huge hand to squeeze my regular-sized shoulder in a way that seemed to say: Hold back, tiger. This isn’t a fight worth wasting your fangs on.
I raised my cuff and checked the time. The hour on my Timex was inching closer to three. I had to head to Neglinnaya Street to meet with the archivist before they closed. I continued to dally, hoping the question of Sausen could be put to a speedy and final rest once the Genevans left our conference room, but, to my chagrin, a catered lunch of overstuffed pastrami sandwiches and sauerkraut was rolled in on a silver cart.
When I could stand it no longer, I escaped. Our final vote wasn’t until Monday, I told myself. It was still Thursday. I raced to the metro and resurfaced at the Kuznetsky Most station among the parked Benzes and baby-faced smokers in business suits. Against the foot traffic, I bolted toward the anodized double doors of the archive building. It was, blessedly, still open. No sooner had I entered the heel-dimpled linoleum lobby than the FSB man on duty—a new fellow this time—informed me the building was about to close.
“It’s a half-hour early,” I protested. With an indifferent tilt of his head he indicated a paper sign taped to the wall: SUMMER HOURS.
“The archivist said he’d be here until three.”
“He left an hour ago.”
I peeked into the reading room. The place was empty. Even impoverished intellectuals had better places to be on a summer afternoon. Then, at the filing closet in the back of the room, I spotted the stoop-shouldered archivist’s assistant. “Hey, remember me!” I waved my hand in his peripheral vision. The man turned his head slowly, reluctantly. I took my cue to approach. “I submitted some documents to you regarding my parents’ files.”
“You’re the one from America.”
“That’s right.”
He sized me up with his falcon eyes. “I filed your request,” he said.
“Oh, good.”
“The personnel will search for it in one of our warehouses. It takes time.”
“How long?” I said, trying not to wince at my own infantile tone.
“Who knows? A week. Two.”
“But I’m leaving Tuesday,” I pleaded.
He considered this. “Have you got someone here who can pick them up for you?”
I paused. I did, of course, have someone, but I was reluctant to have Lenny collect the files on my behalf. Who knew what he’d find in them?
“What if I do?” I said.
“I can give you a form to authorize the receiver. But, mind you, there’s photocopying fees.”
“How much?”
He gave me the price in rubles. It came to almost fifty cents a page.
“How many pages are in a typical dossier?”
He shrugged. “Could be two hundred. Could be six hundred. Depends on the type of crime.”